“I was very nervous taking an online course let alone pursuing my Master degree in a 100% virtual environment. The first day I opened Latte I was full of anxiety and overwhelmed because this was so new to me. This feeling of anxiety was quickly removed as I read through the professors instructions and read the responses from my fellow classmates, I was not in this alone and I had a community of people who were willing to help me out. This community of fellow classmates set the tone for the amazing experience I would have as I moved through the GPS program.

The strength in this program is the experience of the Professors, I was impressed with their knowledge in the course they were teaching and they were willing to share that knowledge with us to help us improve and build on the course material and apply it to our personal and professional life experiences.

The material was relevant and dealt with current issues we face with virtual teams, how to communicate and negotiate with them, how to manage projects and the software that we are using now, and organizational and operational strategies.

Finally, I don’t know what I would have done without my student advisor, Janice Steinberg, who kept in touch with me, answered me promptly every time I had a question (and I had a lot of questions), and was a great support system. The Brandeis GPS program has forever changed my life and I am very grateful that I was able to be a part of such an incredible and wonderful program and community of people.”

Education does not look the same as it did ten – or even five – years ago. Rapid technological innovation combined with evolving economy has made online learning much more prevalent. In many ways, the internet has democratized education, making it possible to learn anywhere, anytime and at a much more affordable price point.

By unlocking greater access to education, online learning has exploded. There is a massive demand for the convenience of web-based learning, and especially for high-quality programs that can match the rich experience of classroom learning.

The result is a tremendous expansion in the field of instructional design and technology, or the creation of dynamic learning content for online delivery. Organizations desire skilled professionals able to translate classroom curriculum into an engaging, instructive online education. They need instructional designers who understand how users interact with these online portals and how to optimize their learning experience.

But developing digital courses requires a dynamic skill set, not easily acquired from any single educational program or work experience.

Interested in innovating the next frontier of education? Here are six reasons you should pursue a career in instructional design.

Industry Demand

The popularity of online learning has skyrocketed in recent years. The convenience of the web makes it possible for working professionals to advance their careers or update their skill set without having to put their job on hold.

“As public and private interest and money flow into this space, the need for highly trained professionals versed in the art and science of instructional design has almost certainly never been higher,” said Jason Gorman, a member of the professional advisory board for Brandeis’ master of science in online instructional design.

The total job postings for employees with instructional design skills and graduate degrees has increased by 63 percent between 2010 to 2013, according to Brandeis’ Advisory Board, and the Bureau of Labor Statistics projects above average growth as high as twenty percent for instructional design jobs between 2010 and 2020.

Opportunity for the pros: over 36,000 jobs will be created in just the next four years, according to the Bureau.

Dynamic Day-to-Day

One of the most appealing aspects of instructional design is it is a dynamic field in which professionals are able to wear multiple hats in their quest to deliver cutting-edge educational experiences. Instructional design is about so much more than building cookie-cutter programs. It’s about understanding how we learn, harnessing technology to improve learning, and creating engaging and effective content to support educational objectives.

Instructional design is a multistage process that calls for a diverse of set of skills. Designers analyze past learning outcomes, and leverage that knowledge to design and develop enhanced instructional programs. They also partner with industry experts or professors to design the curriculum and produce content. They must even act as project managers to oversee how content, instructional tools, and technology integrate to create a dynamic learning environment.

Brandeis’ M.S. in Online Instructional Design & Technology equips students with an extensive and impressive skill set preparing them to meet the diverse demands of instructional design. Glance below to see a preview of promised program outcomes:

Apply evidence-based learning science and online pedagogical principles to the design, development, facilitation, and assessment of online courses and programs.

Evaluate and integrate instructional technologies, platforms, and collaborative tools for use in diverse instructional settings and applications.

Demonstrate creativity and innovation in the application of instructional design principles and technologies to respond to instructional challenges and emerging trends.

Collaboration & Creativity

Far from a mundane profession, instructional design involves considerable collaboration and creativity. Instructional designers partner with industry professionals or academic professors who are experts on topics to to create optimal eLearning experiences. Together, they brainstorm ways to improve upon past programs, add interactive elements, and other measures to make the educational experience more engaging and effective. They also partner in content creation and management to ensure the best possible learning materials are integrated in the curriculum. The wealth of opportunities to get creative and collaborate with others makes instructional design exciting field.

Bridging Theory & Practice

Instructional designers exercise both sides of their brain to translate theory into practice. They must possess the soft skills needed to nurture a sophisticated understanding of how people learn. There is a theoretical science behind learning that should guide and inform the creation of online educational programs. Educational models like ADDIE and other pedagogical principles must form the blueprint of online course design.

But professionals must step beyond theory and apply these principles to build a product. They must master the practice of utilizing technology to develop courseware solve challenges.

The opportunity to put theory into action and see the tangible results is a stimulating and satisfying part of an instructional design career.

Opportunity Across Industries

While educational institutions represent a large portion of the instructional design field, it is far from the only industry implementing web-based educational programs.

“Instructional design has become a crucial skill set for both educational institutions and training and development organizations across a variety of industries and sectors,” said Brian Salerno, who chairs Brandeis’ new master’s program.

Numerous organizations need educational, training, and professional development resources to maintain a productive workforce. Online materials are a cost-effective way to address onboarding, internal training, and various other instructional needs in private, governmental, and nonprofit industries.

From higher education to giant corporations, opportunities are wide open for instructional designers.

Be on the Cutting-Edge

Instructional designers are on the forefront of technological evolutions. Because they often operate in the trenches of development, they have early access to cutting-edge new tools and softwares as they strive to build innovative, forward-thinking web experiences. Brandeis’ new master’s program will train students to effectively implement tools and technologies to build industry-leading courseware. Once in the field, however, this knowledge will only expand as more sophisticated technology emerges in the future.

Brandeis University’s Division of Graduate Professional Studies

Brandeis’ game-changing M.S. in Online Instructional Design & Technology prepares students to be on the forefront of the next frontier in education and training. Not only will they develop a crucial skill set coveted by many organization, but be able to do so on their schedule in small, interactive online courses.

Emerging technologies have unlocked access to massive amounts of data, data that is mounting faster than organizations can process it. Buried under this avalanche of analytics are precious nuggets of information that organizations need to succeed. Companies can use these key insights to optimize efficiency, improve customer service, discover new revenue sources, and more. Those who can bridge the gap between data and business strategy will lead in our new economy.

Big Data’s potential impact on enterprises and industries as a whole is boundless. This potential is already being realized here in the Hub. Boston has been ahead of the curve when it comes to Big Data, thanks to our unique innovation ecosystem or our “Big Data DNA,” the Massachusetts Technology Leadership Council says. As a result, Boston is home to an especially high concentration of Big Data startups, but also powerhouse industries that have strategically leveraged analytics and transformed the space.

Check out how data and analytics has changed these five Boston industries.

These analytics have enabled marketers to access a more comprehensive report of campaign performances and in-depth view of buyer personas. Armed with these insights, marketers are able to refine their campaigns, improve forecasts, and advance their overall strategy.

Big Data also enables targeted marketing, a crucial component of today’s online strategy. You know those eerily accurate advertisements on your Facebook page? You can thank Big Data for that.

Analytics have unlocked enormous potential for marketers to better create, execute, and forecast campaigns. As a result, Boston has boomed with organizations entirely devoted to providing data-driven marketing solutions. HubSpot and Jumptap have emerged as leaders in this space, raising about $2.5 billion combined. Attivio, Visible Measures, DataXu are also leading marketing solutions providers.

Big Data’s impact can be seen first and foremost with the electronic health record. Big Data has launched the electronic health record into the twenty-first century, revolutionizing patient care, and empowering the success of companies like athenahealth based in Watertown.

“The meaningful use of electronic health records is key to ensuring that healthcare focuses on the needs of the patient, is delivered in a coordinated manner, and yields positive health outcomes at the lowest possible cost,” the report said.

The space has expanded even more since Massachusetts passed legislation requiring all providers to adopt electronic health records and connect to the health information exchange, Mass HIway in 2012.

The Shared Health Research Informatics Network (SHRINE) is another local innovation linking five hospitals (Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, Children’s Hospital Boston, Brigham and Women’s, Massachusetts General Hospital and the Dana Farber Cancer Center) in a centralized database to improve efficiency and quality of care.

After genomic data and patient data from electronic medical records, medical devices like pacemakers or a Fitbit, for example, are the fastest-growing sources of healthcare data. All of these rich sources of information can – and are – being leveraged by Boston healthcare providers to improve care and lower costs.

3. Government

The State of Massachusetts and the City of Boston lead the nation with a sophisticated public sector approach to data and analytics. Governor Patrick made Big Data part of policy, launching Massachusetts Big Data Initiative and supporting Mass Open Cloud Initiative, a public cloud that utilizes an innovative open and customizable model. In 2009, the Commonwealth launched the “the Open Data Initiative” inviting the public to access the government’s data library from nearly every department.

But analytics’ impact on the public sector is only beginning. Big Data can significantly improve the quality and efficiency of city services, and do so at a lower cost. But most importantly, data will unlock the future of urban living. Imagine if we knew the location of every bus, train, car, and bike in real-time? Imagine if we knew the profiles of every city building? This is the vision of Boston’s future as a “connected city” outlined in Mass Technology Leadership Council’s 2014 report Big Data & Connected Cities.

“Boston is making great strides in using technology to improve how city services are delivered but we can and will do more,” said Boston Mayor Marty Walsh about MassTLC’s report. “We are making vast amounts of the city’s big data available online to the public to not only increase transparency but to also spur innovation.”

Walsh has shown support for a data-driven, connected city and plans to hire a City of Boston Chief Digital Officer to help make this vision a reality.

4. Energy

Big Data is a big reason Boston has evolved as a leader in the energy industry. Tapping into Big Data yields much more comprehensive, accurate reports of energy usage and also illuminates how these building can operate more efficiently. As a result, the industry has boomed with companies helping buildings go green to save green, including local leaders EnerNoc, Retroficiency, and NextStepLiving. Buildings in Boston and beyond are being constructed or retrofitted with building automation systems – cloud-based, centralized control centers – which collect massive amounts of data, report on energy consumption in real-time, and can continually adjust building performance for optimum efficiency. This “smart” living is the wave of the future and entirely driven by Big Data.

5. Financial Services

Financial services is the fifth largest vertical for Big Data in Massachusetts. Big Data has made it possible to analyze financial data sets that previously weren’t accessible. Financial analysts now can examine and interpret unprecedented amounts of information and do so in new and innovative ways. For example, stock traders can collect and mine mass amounts of social media information to gauge public sentiment about products or companies, Information Week said.

Three years ago as the manager of the Program Management Group within the Manufacturing and Global Supply Chain (MGSC) Division, my manager challenged me to build my business acumen. To meet this challenge, I started researching: certifications, certificates, and degree programs.

Eventually I came across the Brandeis program, the curriculum was exactly what I was looking for to build on my existing Program Management skills. During the pursuit of my degree at Brandeis I took four classes on campus and six online. Although I was hesitant at first about taking online classes, the online option provided an increased level of flexibility. This proved to be a key feature of the program as I ended up Program Managing two projects with our team in Belgium while attending classes online. I was able to travel as often as required with no impact to my ability to participate in class.

Upon completion of my degree, I was promoted to senior manager in charge of Framingham manufacturing operations and the MGSC Program Management group. The Brandeis degree built my business acumen and provided me the opportunity to continue to grow with my company.

Brandeis developed the program, which will be offered online, in response to the growing need for professionals highly skilled in the development of digital learning resources to support the rapid proliferation of online education courses and e-Learning powered training programs.

The Advisory Board reports that the demand for graduates with instructional design skills has increased in recent years, with a 63 percent increase in total job postings from 2010 to 2013, and a 50 percent increase in job postings for instructional designers and technologists. They also found that employers increasingly demand instructional designers with content development and collaboration skills.

“As public and private interest and money flow into this space, the need for highly trained professionals versed in the art and science of instructional design has almost certainly never been higher,” said Jason Gorman, a member of the professional advisory board for Brandeis’ master of science in online instructional design and technology program and vice president of learning experience design services at Six Red Marbles, the largest US-based development house for learning materials.

The Brandeis program will prepare students to harness educational technologies in the development of online courseware, use iterative and formative course development processes, and apply evidence-based learning methodologies to the design of dynamic online learning courses.

The program includes courses focusing on how to effectively apply various instructional design methodologies and principles of learning science to online course development, as well as courses focusing on the creative utilization of instructional technologies such as learning management systems and rich interactive courseware authoring tools. The program is designed to help instructional designers, educational technologists, and training and development specialists to successfully manage instructional design projects, work effectively with subject matter experts, apply evidence-based course design principles, and develop dynamic learning content to support fully-online course and program design and delivery.

Six core courses and four electives are required (a total of 30 graduate credits). Students may enroll in up to two courses before officially applying for admission.

“Instructional design has become a crucial skill set for both educational institutions and training and development organizations across a variety of industries and sectors,” said Brian Salerno, who chairs the new program. “The Internet and mobile platforms have emerged as a desirable delivery medium for learning and training materials, as well as educational courses. Instructional designers help organizations not just transition their learning content online, but help them to design effective online courses that harness all the advantages that instructional technology has to offer.”

Program graduates will be able to:

Apply evidence-based learning science and online pedagogical principles to the design, development, facilitation, and assessment of online courses and programs.

Evaluate and integrate instructional technologies, platforms, and collaborative tools for use in diverse instructional settings and applications.

Demonstrate creativity and innovation in the application of instructional design principles and technologies to respond to instructional challenges and emerging trends.

Lead and manage online instructional design and technology teams and projects, utilizing effective written and oral communication strategies.

This is the eighth part-time, online master degree program offered by Brandeis’ division of Graduate Professional Studies. The programs are geared for professionals looking to advance in their fields and keep up-to-date on the latest practices. Students are taught techniques that they can apply immediately in their places of work. The course instructors bring their applied experiences into the online classrooms, and the programs’ professional advisory boards help ensure that the courses and programs remain current and relevant.

Back when I was a manager inside organizations, I had many days that looked like this:

Meetings at 9am, 10am, 11am.

Working meeting through lunch (noon-1pm)

Meetings at 1pm, 2pm, 3pm.

I finally got a chance to check my email at 4pm. That’s when I discovered the world had blown up earlier in the day! (This is before cell phones. Yes, there was a time before cell phones.)

I then ran around like a chicken with my head cut off until I left work at 5:30pm, because, yes, I had a family, and, yes, I had to leave at 5:30pm. I either made dinner or picked up children, depending on my agreement with Mark.

We did the family stuff until 8pm, and when the kids went to sleep, I went back to work.

No wonder I was exhausted. My decision-making sometimes suffered, too. No surprise there.

Luckily, I had some days that did not look like this. I could solve the problems I encountered. And, some of these meetings were problem-solving meetings.

However, I had jobs where my senior managers did not manage their project portfolios, and we had many crises du jour. My VP would try to catch me on the way to my next meeting, and attempt to get me to “commit” to when a patch would be available or when we would start, or finish a project.

I swear, one of my VP’s used to know when I went to the ladies’ room. He did yell at me through the door, just as in this management myth.

This management myth is something I see often in organizations. This one is the one where people are running around so often they don’t actually solve problems.

Many problems are a combination of several problems. You might have to separate the problems and attack them in sequence. But, you might have to see the whole first, because there might be delays. The overarching problem is this: if you don’t give yourself enough time as a problem solving team, you can’t tell what the problem is. If you can’t tell what the problem is, you can’t solve it.

Problem solving tends to go through the process of:

Problem definition: What do we think the problem is?

Problem discussion: Let’s get all the divergent ideas on the table. Brainstorm, whatever we need to do.

Select a solution: Converge on a solution, trying out the ideas, understanding the results of each potential solution

Determine an action plan, with dates and people’s names associated with each step

Your problem solving might vary from this a bit, but that’s the general idea.

If you never give yourself enough time to solve problems because you’re always running around, how can you solve problems? It’s a problem. (Like the recursion there?)

That’s this month’s management myth, I Can Concentrate on the Run. Maybe your myth is that you can concentrate in a 10-minute standup. Maybe your myth is that you can concentrate on your drive into work. You might be able to, for some problems. Complex management problems require more than one person to solve them. They require more than a few minutes thought.

How do you solve complex problems in your organization? Do the problems run around the organization for a while? Or, do you solve them?

Today a client asked me to add an “average of averages” figure to some of his performance reports. I freely admit that a nervous and audible groan escaped my lips as I felt myself at risk of tumbling helplessly into the fifth dimension of “Simpson’s Paradox”– that is, the somewhat confusing statement that averaging the averages of different populations produces the average of the combined population. (I encourage you to hang in and keep reading, because ignoring this concept is an all too common and serious hazard of reporting data, and you absolutely need to understand and steer clear of it!)

Imagine that we’re analyzing data for several different physicians in a group. We establish a relation or correlation for each doctor to some outcome of interest (patient mortality, morbidity, client satisfaction). Simpson’s Paradox states that when we combine all of the doctors and their results, and look at the data in aggregate form, we may discover that the relation established by our previous research has reversed itself. Sometimes this results from some lurking variable(s) that we haven’t considered. Sometimes, it may be due simply to the numerical values of the data.

First, the “lurking variable” scenario. Imagine we are analyzing the following data for two surgeons:

Surgeon A operated on 100 patients; 95 survived (95% survival rate).

Surgeon B operated on 80 patients; 72 survived (90% survival rate).

At first glance, it would appear that Surgeon A has a better survival rate — but do these figures really provide an accurate representation of each doctor’s performance?

Deeper analysis reveals the following: of the 100 procedures performed by Surgeon A,

50 were classified as high-risk; 47 of those patients survived (94% survival rate)

When we include the lurking classification variable (high-risk versus routine surgeries), the results are remarkably transformed.

Now we can see that Surgeon A has a much higher survival rate in the high-risk category (94% v. 80%), while Surgeon B has a better survival rate in the routine category (100% v. 96%).

Let’s consider the second scenario, where numerical values can change results.

First, imagine that every month, the results of a patient satisfaction survey are exactly the same (Table 1).

The Table shows that calculating an average of each month’s result produces the same result (90%) as calculating a Weighted Average (90%). This congruence exists because each month, the denominator and numerator are exactly the same, contributing equally to the results.

Now consider Table 2, which also displays the number of responses received from a monthly patient-satisfaction survey, but where the number of responses and the number of patients who report being satisfied differ from month to month. In this case, taking an average of each month’s percentage allows some months to contribute to or affect the final result more than others. Here, for example, we are led to believe that 70% of patients are satisfied.

All results should in fact be treated as the data-set of interest, where the denominator is Total Responses (2,565) and the numerator is Total Satisfied (1,650). This approach correctly accounts for the fact that there is a different number of values each month, weights them equally, and produces a correct satisfaction rate of 64%. That is quite a difference from our previous answer of 6% — almost 145 patients!

How we calculate averages really does matter if we are committed to understanding our data and reporting it correctly. It matters if we want to identify opportunities to improve, and are committed to taking action.

As a final thought about averages, here is a wryly amusing bit of wisdom on the topic that also has the virtue of being concise. “No matter how long he lives, a man never becomes as wise as the average woman of 48.” -H. L. Mencken.

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For the first time ever, the city of Boston will be hosting Boston FinTech Week, a four-day event featuring some of the world’s biggest and brightest financial services institutions and the people behind them. Sponsored in part by Brandeis GPS, Boston FinTech Week (which runs from September 11-14) is a collection of conferences, networking opportunities, […]

By Nicole Russo I don’t think that I realized this at the time, but a major contributing factor in my pursuit of a career in higher education was community. In my own undergraduate experience, I felt support from my fellow peers, as well as mentorship and guidance from the faculty and staff. I had not […]

After starting his master’s as an undergraduate, a Brandeis University alumnus proves that full-time work and graduate school can co-exist. Three days after graduating from Brandeis University with a BS in Health: Science, Society, and Policy (HSSP) and a minor in Economics, Allan Chuang (class of 2017) enrolled in the university’s Health and Medical Informatics […]

By Mike Storiale When FinTech began its ascent, single-solution providers opened the door to expertise and simplicity rarely brought to the table by traditional banks. Solutions designed to meet unique needs created excitement from consumers and investors alike. Throughout the industry, experts discussed the need for an open architecture from banks and FinTechs to empower […]

By Lance Eaton That’s always the first question I get when I tell people that I am an instructional designer (an ID for those of us “in the know”). It all started when I was 6 years old, and my dad asked me what I wanted to be when I grew up. I peered up […]

It was so good to see Brandeis University alumni at #DeisReunion17 last weekend! In case you missed us at the festivities on campus, we want to make sure you know about the Brandeis alumni tuition discount on all Graduate Professional Studies courses and programs. Whether you’re looking to obtain a master’s degree or supplement your […]

It’s been a few weeks since the GPS class of 2017 commencement ceremony. Congratulations once again to those who received their degree! We’re checking in to remind all GPS alumni – past and recent – about your tuition discount and an important change to our academic calendar. Starting in fall 2017, GPS will be moving […]

Members of the Brandeis GPS Community may submit job postings from within their industries to advertise exclusively to our community. This is a great way to further connect and seek out opportunities as they come up. If you are interested in posting an opportunity, please complete the following form found here. Where: Cambridge, MA About: […]

Members of the Brandeis GPS Community may submit job postings from within their industries to advertise exclusively to our community. This is a great way to further connect and seek out opportunities as they come up. If you are interested in posting an opportunity, please complete the following form found here. Where: REsurety, Boston, MA […]

The Rabb School of Continuing Studies awarded diplomas to more than 100 GPS students at its 2017 commencement ceremony this Sunday, May 21. Approximately 45 members of the graduating class attended the event, which took place on campus from 8 to 9:30 a.m. at the Faculty Club. “Not only have you mastered a rigorous curriculum, […]